Part 28--June, 2011

* 6/1/11--President Obama’s faith adviser, Eboo Patel, likened television evangelist Pat Robertson to Osama bin Laden, calling both “totalitarians” who worked collectively against coexistence. The statements by Patel mark the latest in a series of controversial remarks by the faith adviser to be reported by WND, including comments against the U.S. and Christianity. In February 2010, Obama named Patel to his Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. Patel, a Muslim activist, is the founder and executive director of Chicago-based Interfaith Youth Core, which says it promotes pluralism by teaming people of different faiths on service projects.--WorldNetDaily

* 6/2/11--Yesterday, amidst a triple-digit Wall Street slide, Peter Yastrow, market strategist for Yastrow Origer, told CNBC... "We're on the verge of a great, great depression. The [Federal Reserve] knows it." According to Yastrow there is a strong "discontent with the American economy." CNBC today reported, "The last month has been a horror show for the U.S. economy, with economic data falling off a cliff, according to Mike Riddell, a fund manager at M&G Investments in London." Many economists agree that out-of-control Government spending is wreaking havoc on our nation's economic recovery. The government's stalemate over whether or not to raise the debt ceiling - and how to curb future government spending and debt keeps the economy and American's hopes for recovery in a precarious position. After the budget compromise was exposed as a SHAM, Congress now wants us to believe that we must raise the debt ceiling to avoid a colossal meltdown of epic proportions. That rhetoric is also a sham!--Grassroots Action Alert

* 6/2/11--As you probably remember, while ObamaCare was being ram-rodded through Congress, the Obama/Reid/Pelosi machine promised that ObamaCare's individual mandates were NOT taxes. In passing the Act, Congress explicitly stated that it was doing so under the Commerce Clause, and not creating a new tax. In court however, Eric Holder's Department of Justice has argued that these mandates ARE taxes and that Congress has a constitutional right to levy taxes. Now that ObamaCare is moving through the courts, this question of "Tax or not a Tax?" has become crucial. In fact, the Fourth Circuit Court recently asked Liberty Counsel and the Department of Justice to file a "supplemental brief" in large part to address this question. If ObamaCare is a "tax" then the Fourth Circuit would no longer have jurisdiction. In a stunning development, the Department of Justice (DOJ) has essentially agreed with Liberty Counsel that ObamaCare's mandates are in fact penalties and the Fourth Circuit should rule on this case! This concession is huge! That means both sides agree on this potentially sticky point that could have derailed the case. Liberty Counsel now expects a ruling by the end of the month, most likely on the merits of the case. From there the case is expected to be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.--Liberty Counsel (Grassroots Action Alert)

* 6/2/11--An international expert on scanners and document-imaging software filed a 22-page criminal complaint with the FBI, charging that the long-form birth certificate released by the White House is criminally fraudulent. “What the Obama administration released is a PDF image that they are trying to pass off as a Certificate of Live Birth Long Form printed on green security paper by the Hawaiian Health Department,” Doug Vogt writes, “but this form is a created forgery.” Vogt’s criminal complaint asserts: “I have irrefutably proven that the Certificate of Live Birth that President Obama presented to the world on April 27, 2011, is a fraudulently created document put together using the Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator programs, and the creation of this forgery of a public document constitutes a class B felony in Hawaii and multiple violations under U.S. Code section Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47, Sec.1028, and therefore an impeachable offense.” When the Obama birth certificate “forgery” comes to the public’s attention, Vogt continues, “It will surpass all previous scandals including the Watergate scandal of the Nixon administration.” Since 1993, Vogt has owned Archive Index Systems Inc., in Bellevue, Wash., a company that sells a wide variety of document scanners worldwide and develops document imaging software. Before that, Vogt owned Nova Typesetting for 11 years.--WorldNetDaily

* 6/2/11--PRINCETON, NJ -- Americans break into two roughly evenly matched camps on the question of whether the government should enact heavy taxes on the rich to redistribute wealth in the U.S. Forty-seven percent believe the government should redistribute wealth in this way, while 49% disagree, similar to views Gallup found four years ago. Republicans and Democrats have sharply different reactions to the government's taking such an active role in equalizing economic outcomes. Seven in 10 Democrats believe the government should levy taxes on the rich to redistribute wealth, while an equal proportion of Republicans believe it should not. The slight majority of independents oppose this policy.--gallup.com

* 6/2/11--A federal judge has ordered a Texas school district to prohibit public prayer at a high school graduation ceremony. (Clinton appointee) Chief U.S. District Judge Fred Biery’s order against the Medina Valley Independent School District also forbids students from using specific religious words including “prayer” and “amen.” The ruling was in response to a lawsuit filed by Christa and Danny Schultz. Their son is among those scheduled to participate in Saturday’s graduation ceremony. The judge declared that the Schultz family and their son would “suffer irreparable harm” if anyone prayed at the ceremony. Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott said the school district is in the process of appealing the ruling, and his office has agreed to file a brief in their support. “Part of this goes to the very heart of the unraveling of moral values in this country,” Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott told Fox News Radio, saying the judge wanted to turn school administrators into “speech police.” “I’ve never seen such a restriction on speech issued by a court or the government,” Abbott told Fox News Radio. “It seems like a trampling of the First Amendment rather than protecting the First Amendment.” Judge Biery’s ruling banned students and other speakers from using religious language in their speeches. Among the banned words or phrases are: “join in prayer,” “bow their heads,” “amen,” and “prayer.” He also ordered the school district to remove the terms “invocation” and “benediction” from the graduation program. “These terms shall be replaced with ‘opening remarks’ and ‘closing remarks,'” the judge’s order stated. His ruling also prohibits anyone from saying, “in [a deity’s name] we pray.” Should a student violate the order, school district officials could find themselves in legal trouble. Judge Biery ordered that his ruling be “enforced by incarceration or other sanctions for contempt of Court if not obeyed by District official (sic) and their agents.” The Texas attorney general called the ruling unconstitutional and a blatant attack from those who do not believe in God -- “attempts by atheists and agnostics to use courts to eliminate from the public landscape any and all references to God whatsoever.” “This is the challenge we are dealing with here,” he said. “(It’s) an ongoing attempt to purge God from the public setting while at the same time demanding from the courts an increased yielding to all things atheist and agnostic.” Ayesa Khan, an attorney representing the student and his parents, told KABB-TV she was delighted in the judge’s decision. “It caused him a great deal of anxiety,” she said, referring to her teenage client. “He has gone to meet with the principal to try and talk in a civilized way about long-standing problems, and the school district has continued to thumb its nose.” The judge did grant students permission to make the sign of the cross, wear religious garb or kneel to face Mecca. But that’s not good enough for some students at the high school. “It’s just a big surprise that one kid can come in and change what’s been a tradition since Medina Valley started,” student Abigail Russell told KABB-TV. Fellow student Alicia Jade Geurin agreed. “At graduation, I would love to be able to speak from my heart,” she told the TV station. “But in this situation I feel my freedom of speech and my First Amendment is being infringed upon if I can’t say what I feel.” But the Rev. Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, hailed the judge’s decision. “This is a high school graduation,” he told Fox News Radio. “It is not a church service.” Lynn was critical of the attorney general’s allegation that the ruling was an attempt to purge Christianity from the public square. “Any attorney general worth his salt would know that’s the issue and that this is not about promoting atheism,” he said. “That’s ludicrous.”--foxnews.com

* 6/2/11--Documents made public yesterday by Judicial Watch describe extensive collusion by Federal Communications Commission officials with a left-wing advocacy group in a campaign to expand government regulation of the Internet. The documents, obtained by Judicial Watch in a December 2010 Freedom of Information Act request, were created after Democrat appointees solidified their 3-2 control of the agency in March 2009. Judicial Watch is a conservative nonprofit that specializes in using the FOIA and other avenues to expose corruption in government. The coordination between FCC officials and Free Press, the advocacy group, supported a proposal for the agency to regulate access to the Internet as if it were a public utility, in the interest of ensuring "Net Neutrality." Proponents said doing so would assure equal access for all Internet users by barring companies from offering preferred rates for higher delivery speeds. Other users, especially in communities with limited Internet access, would be forced to accept poorer service. But critics said the proposal would actually give the FCC a tool to regulate content, and they argued that the FCC has no authority over the medium in the first place. It would be akin to forcing FedEx and UPS to treat all packages the same way the U.S. Postal Service does. Free Press is the most vocal of a number of far-left and liberal advocacy groups that for nearly a decade have pushed numerous proposals for vastly increasing government regulation of the Internet. The evidence of coordination between FCC Democrats and Free Press uncovered by Judicial Watch includes:

Emails between former Free Press president John Silver and Democratic FCC Commissioner Michael Copps from October 2010, coordinating "how we'd like to proceed during these next three months on NN [net neutrality]."

Documents summarizing a phone call between Silver and Copps in which, before an FCC vote on the proposal in November 2010, Silver "emphasized that a strong net neutrality rule is critical to preserving the Internet as a vibrant forum for speech, commerce, innovation and cultural expression."

Correspondence between FCC Special Counsel David Tannenbaum and Free Press Policy Director Ben Scott coordinating speakers for a taxpayer-funded series of FCC "internet workshops" that were intended to generate public support for the proposal.

Free Press was co-founded by Monthly Review editor Robert McChesney and the Nation contributor John Nichols. The Monthly Review is "an independent Marxist journal," while the Nation has long described itself as "the flagship of the left." Free Press is partially funded by George Soros' Open Society Institute. In April 2010, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled that the FCC did not have the legal authority to regulate the Internet. Despite this ruling, in December the FCC voted 3-2, along party lines, to begin the Net Neutrality regulation process anyway. As an independent agency, the FCC is required to regulate impartially. Internal FCC rules require all employees to disclose all communication made by interested parties and "directed to the merits or outcome of a proceeding" unless they fit a narrow set of exceptions (e.g., the communication "directly relates to an emergency in which the safety of life is endangered or substantial loss of property is threatened"). An FCC spokesman failed to return multiple calls seeking comment. Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said the documents released by his organization suggest "nothing less than the Obama administration's attempt to stage a government takeover of the Internet under the guise of Net Neutrality. So it should come as no surprise that Free Press, the hard-left organization with socialist ties, is improperly driving the so-called Net Neutrality agenda from inside the Obama administration." Fitton added that "the FCC is supposed to be an independent agency that follows the law. The American people should be deeply troubled by the fact that the Obama administration, on issue after issue, seems to be run by shadowy leftist organizations." --washingtonexaminer.com

* 6/3/11--WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Employers hired far fewer workers than expected in May and the jobless rate rose to 9.1 percent, raising concerns the economy might be stuck in a painful slow-growth mode.--Reuters

* 6/6/11--"The president and his supporters call for tax increases as a means to cover the deficit, but higher tax revenues cannot eliminate the deficit. Controlling for inflation, federal tax revenue today is 23 times greater than it was in 1960, but congressional spending is 42 times greater. During the last half-century, except for five years, the nation has faced a federal budget deficit. It's just simple math. If tax revenues soar, but congressional spending soars more, budget deficits cannot be avoided. People ask what can be done to save our nation from decline. To ask that represents a misunderstanding of history and possibly a bit of arrogance. After all, how different are Americans from the Romans, Spaniards, French and the English? These were once mighty nations standing at the top of civilization. At the height of these nation's prosperity, no one would have predicted that they'd become third-rate nations, especially England. ... One chief causal factor for the decline of these former great nations is what has been described as 'bread and circuses,' where government spends money for the shallow and immediate wants of the population, and civic virtue all but disappears. For the past half-century, our nation has been doing precisely what brought down other great nations. We might have now reached the point of no return. If so, do we deserve it?" --economist Walter E. Williams (From Patriot Post Brief)

* 6/6/11--The Iranian regime is closer than ever before to creating a nuclear bomb, according to RAND Corporation researcher Gregory S. Jones. At its current rate of uranium enrichment, Tehran could have enough for its first bomb within eight weeks, Jones said in a report published this week. He added that despite reports of setbacks in its nuclear program, the Iranian regime is steadily progressing towards a bomb. Unfortunately, Jones says, there is nothing the US can do to stop Tehran, short of military occupation. The researcher based his report on recent findings by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), published two weeks ago. Making the bomb will take around two months, he says, because constructing a nuclear warhead is a complicated step in the process. Jones stresses that stopping Iran will require deploying forces on the ground, because airstrikes are no longer sufficient. The reality is that the US and Israel have failed to keep Iran from developing a nuclear warhead whenever it wants, Jones says. It's time to recognize that this policy has failed and decide on the following steps, based on realistic assessment of Iranian uranium-enrichment efforts, he adds. According to Jones, Tehran has produced 38.3 kg of uranium enriched at 19.7%. If its centrifuges continue to work at the current capacity, it will take around two months for the Iranian regime to produce the 20 kg of uranium enriched to 90% required for the production of a nuclear warhead.--ynetnews.com

* 6/7/11--The federal government's financial condition deteriorated rapidly last year, far beyond the $1.5 trillion in new debt taken on to finance the budget deficit, a USA TODAY analysis shows. The government added $5.3 trillion in new financial obligations in 2010, largely for retirement programs such as Medicare and Social Security. That brings to a record $61.6 trillion the total of financial promises not paid for. This gap between spending commitments and revenue last year equals more than one-third of the nation's gross domestic product. Medicare alone took on $1.8 trillion in new liabilities, more than the record deficit prompting heated debate between Congress and the White House over lifting the debt ceiling....The $61.6 trillion in unfunded obligations amounts to $534,000 per household. That's more than five times what Americans have borrowed for everything else — mortgages, car loans and other debt. It reflects the challenge as the number of retirees soars over the next 20 years and seniors try to collect on those spending promises. "The (federal) debt only tells us what the government owes to the public. It doesn't take into account what's owed to seniors, veterans and retired employees," says accountant Sheila Weinberg, founder of the Institute for Truth in Accounting, a Chicago-based group that advocates better financial reporting. "Without accurate accounting, we can't make good decisions."--USA Today

* 6/7/11--Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne today blasted the Obama Administration for filing a late amicus brief in the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals that would push for the ability for illegal immigrants to vote. In the Gonzalez v State case, a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit ruled that Arizona could not require persons registering to vote to provide proof of citizenship. The Ninth Circuit has granted en banc review and Attorney General Horne will personally be arguing the case before an eleven-judge panel on June 21, 2011. Late Friday afternoon, the Obama Administration filed a late, eleventh-hour amicus brief arguing that Arizona should not be able to request information to check if applicants wanting to vote are citizens. Horne stated: “First, the Obama Administration fails to do its job on the border. Then it sues Arizona to prevent us from helping to fight illegal immigration. Then it tries to create a false sense of complacency by arguing that the border is safe, when it isn’t. Now it argues that persons should be able to register to vote without providing adequate information enabling verification of citizenship, thus enabling illegal aliens to register to vote. This is contrary to the interests of the people of the United State of America.”--freerepublic.com

* 6/8/11--Most voters still believe President Obama is more liberal than they are, while just one-out-of-four say they share the same ideological views as the president. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that 54% of Likely U.S. Voters think Obama is more ideologically liberal than they are, while only 13% view him as more conservative. Twenty-four percent (24%) say their political views are about the same as the president's. The number who see the president as more liberal than they are stayed at 57% in three-out-of-four previous surveys conducted since August of last year. That number climbed to 61% in late February. The number who view the president as more conservative ranged from nine percent (9%) to 12% in that same period. The number of voters who say they share about the same political views as the president ties the lowest result measured since August and, interestingly, compares exactly with the number who say the same of Congress. Only 24% of voters hold about the same ideological views as the average Republican member of Congress, and another 24% feel that way about the views of the average Democratic congressman. Forty-five percent (45%) of Democratic voters, however, say their views are about the same as the president’s, although that ties the lowest finding to date. The number of Democrats who felt this way peaked at 60% in late February. Twenty-four percent (24%) of Democrats say the president is more conservative than they are, while 22% think he is more liberal.--rasmussenreports.com

* 6/8/11--"You've got to hand it to President Obama and his White House economic team. Faced with [Friday's] dreary May jobs report, they did their best and rolled out the old 'bump in the road' analogy for comfort. As chief White House economist Austan Goolsbee put it, 'there are always bumps on the road to recovery, but the overall trajectory of the economy has improved dramatically over the past two years.' Nice try, but there's no way to spin news that the economy in May created only 54,000 new jobs, which is about one-third the number necessary to keep up with the growth in the labor force. The jobless rate rose for the second straight month to 9.1%, which is especially depressing nearly two years after the end of a very deep recession. At this stage in the Reagan expansion, after a comparably deep 1981-82 recession, the economy was growing by 7% a year and the jobless rate was plunging. This time the economy is growing by less than 2%, and we still have 6.8 million fewer jobs than when the recession began in late 2007. ... The same economists and pundits who promoted the economic policies of the last four years are now lamenting the jobs bust and demanding that Washington double down: More stimulus spending, more Federal Reserve easing, more temporary tax rebates. They can't explain why these policies have failed to date, but we are supposed to rinse and repeat. ... The economy doesn't need more of this. It needs a return to the growth agenda that created the long post-1982 boom."--The Wall Street Journal (From Patriot Post Chronicle)

* 6/8/11--Fish, fowl and politicians, they’re all in cahoots to kill jobs, say congressional Republicans, who are circling the wagons out West to protect their way of life. First there’s the dune sagebrush lizard that is ganging up with the prairie chickens to halt oil and gas development. It seems that the lizard doesn’t like walking across the ground if it has been disturbed by a tractor, or mating near the thump-thump of an oil rig. Then there’s the Delta smelt out in California, it needs billions of gallons of water to survive, causing a man-made drought that is turning farmlands into dust bowls. And in the Gulf region where oil production is but a trickle of its former self to avoid another blowout that could destroy that environment, job losses are running in the tens of thousands. “If Salazar’s job is to kill jobs, then he gets an A plus,” said Rep. Devin Nunes (R. –Calif.). “His department has killed more jobs in the U.S. than any other federal agency.” Nunes and other Republicans say the Interior Department is waging a war against jobs using radical environmental policies as its weapon of choice. And in some cases, even eco-friendly energy development is getting the cold shoulder. "You can’t make this stuff up,” Nunes says.--Audrey Hudson, Daily Events
* 6/9/11--Clearly, the "homosexual normalization" is a high priority for the Left, and they are focusing most of their energy on two fields of opportunity. The first is overturning federal laws which "discriminate against gays," beginning with proscriptions concerning homosexuals in our military service branches. Until 1993, when Bill Clinton instituted the so-called "don't ask, don't tell" policy giving legal standing to homosexuals in our military and intelligence institutions, those organizations maintained long-standing moratoriums prohibiting homosexual employment because they posed a high risk of compromise, and moreover because of the obvious degradation of morale associated with homosexuals in military ranks. However, in 2008, Obama made it a "top priority" of his administration to repeal DADT and allow open homosexual access to any and all military operations. In 2010, the United States suffered the largest intelligence compromise in history, by a disgruntled homosexual, Army PFC Bradley Manning. Devastated over news that his "partner" was leaving him, Manning attempted to win back his boyfriend's affections by "heroically" stealing, according to allegations, some 500,000 classified documents and communiqués from the government's SIPRNet and JWICS intelligence sharing networks. He then provided them to WikiLeaks for publication. Manning is now in lockdown at Ft. Leavenworth, charged with "aiding and abetting the enemy," which is a capital offense. Obama's response? He has had scant to say about Manning's treason, and just months after Manning's arrest, and before Democrat congressional ranks were decimated by incoming Republicans from the midterm election, Obama had Democrats in Congress push through "Do Ask, Do Tell" legislation, which ended any proscription against homosexuals in the military. This will open the gate for the other primary "gay agenda" items, such as legal recognition of their partners for insurance and other financial benefits. Obama already ordered Navy chaplains to perform same-sex unions, but Congress pulled the reigns back on that maneuver, reminding Obama that the Defense of Marriage Act is still intact.--Patriot Post

6/11/11--The trove of more than 13,000 emails detailing almost every aspect of Sarah Palin’s governorship of Alaska, released late on Friday, paints a picture of her as an idealistic, conscientious, humorous and humane woman slightly bemused by the world of politics. One can only assume that the Left-leaning editors who dispatched teams of reporters to remote Juneau, the Alaskan capital, to pore over the emails in the hope of digging up a scandal are now viewing the result as a rather poor return on their considerable investment. If anything, Mrs Palin seems likely to emerge from the scrutiny of the 24,000 pages, contained in six boxes and weighing 275 pounds, with her reputation considerably enhanced. As a blogger at Powerline noted, the whole saga might come to be viewed as “an embarrassment for legacy media”.--telegraph.co.uk

* 6/14/11--(CNSNews.com) – Twenty-eight months after Congress passed President Obama’s signature economic stimulus law, and nearly one year after he declared the summer of 2010 to be “Recovery Summer,” 1.9 million fewer people are employed. In February 2009, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported that 141.7 million people were employed. By the end of May 2011 – the last month for which data are available – that number had fallen to 139.8 million, a difference of 1.9 million.

* 6/17/11--When it comes to measuring the combination of unemployment and inflation, it doesn’t get much more miserable than this. In fact, misery, as measured in the unofficial Misery Index that simply totals the unemployment and inflation rates, is at a 28-year high, reflective of how weak the economic recovery has been and how far there is to go. The index, first compiled during the soaring inflation days of the 1970s by economist Arthur Okun, is registering a nausea-inducing 12.7—9.1 percent for unemployment and 3.6 percent for annualized inflation—a number not seen since 1983. The index has been above 10 since November 2009 and had been under double-digits from June 1993 through May 2008.--cnbc.com

* 6/17/11--Where are the jobs? Given to those who raise money for Obama. "More than two years after Obama took office vowing to banish 'special interests' from his administration, nearly 200 of his biggest donors have landed plum government jobs and advisory posts, won federal contracts worth millions of dollars for their business interests or attended numerous elite White House meetings and social events," Politico reports. "These 'bundlers' raised at least $50,000 -- and sometimes more than $500,000 -- in campaign donations for Obama's campaign." For comparison's sake, Public Citizen in 2008 found that George W. Bush had appointed about 200 bundlers to administration posts during his eight years in office. That's roughly the same number Obama has appointed in little more than two years. The White House insists that all these jobs were on the up-and-up, but it's hard to deny the correlation. Somehow, this makes all those promises about "Hope and Change" seem even hollower.--(From Patriot Post Digest)

* 6/17/11--The Wisconsin Supreme Court this week reinstated the state's recently passed law eliminating collective bargaining for state employees. It had been struck down by Judge Maryann Sumi, who said that Republicans broke procedural rules when passing it. The Supreme Court wrote, "This court will not determine whether internal operating rules or procedural statutes have been complied with by the legislature in the course of its enactments." In other words, separation of powers carried the day. Recently re-elected Justice David Prosser was part of the majority. He had been challenged by union-backed leftist JoAnne Kloppenburg earlier this year. The victory isn't final, either, as unions have filed a challenge in federal court, this time arguing, according to Reuters, that the law "creates two classes of public workers in the state -- those covered by the new rules and those exempt from them." --(From Patriot Post Digest)

* 6/17/11--In December 2010, the Senate ratified one of the Obama regime's key international efforts, the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START). At the time, Obama and his minions sold the treaty as a great benefit to the U.S. and world peace. It required, or so we were told, both the U.S. and Russia to reduce the number of strategic nuclear warheads by 30 percent, from 2,200 to 1,550 warheads each, and it capped the number of allowed strategic launchers, including both missiles and bombers, at 700 each. Both sides are required to be at or below these ceilings by 2018. Skeptics noted that the treaty would buy the U.S. nothing, would not reduce existing weapons by 30 percent, and in fact would require only the U.S. to eliminate weapons. As usual, the skeptics were savaged by the Left as warmongers, with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee that treaty skeptics "just don't believe in arms-control treaties at all and from my perspective are very unfortunately slanting a lot of what they say." Well, the truth has now come out. On June 1, the results of the weapons data exchange between the U.S. and Russia required by the treaty were released by the State Department, and they conclusively demonstrate that the skeptics were right. The treaty requires nothing of Russia in terms of lowering her strategic force numbers. The day the treaty went into force, Feb. 5, Russia was already below the START ceilings for both strategic nuclear launchers and warheads. Russia had 521 strategic launchers, well below the treaty limit of 700, and 1,537 warheads, below the new ceiling of 1,550. So rather than reducing forces, the treaty allows Russia to build additional weapons to reach the new limits, and Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov has said that Russia will do so by 2028. As for the U.S? We must make weapon reductions, of course, including a 25 percent cut in strategic launchers. So the truth is that the Obama regime lied (again) to the American people about this treaty and falsely accused skeptics of being warmongers, all the while knowingly selling out America's nuclear forces. There's a word that comes to mind here. It starts with a "t" and has seven letters, but for some reason we're drawing a blank... --(From Patriot Post Digest)

* 6/17/11-- WASHINGTON — President Obama rejected the views of top lawyers at the Pentagon and the Justice Department when he decided that he had the legal authority to continue American military participation in the air war in Libya without Congressional authorization, according to officials familiar with internal administration deliberations.--NY Times

* 6/18/11--The U.S. economy remains in the doldrums and Obamanomics is making matters worse, as every day seems to bring another dose of bad business news. Not for the faint at heart, here are the Top 10 Scariest Economic Developments:

1. Jobs surge, but only at McDonald’s: The Labor Department’s June unemployment report shows anemic job growth and that the jobless rate ticked up to 9.1%. Even worse, of the 54,000 jobs created, fully half were people hired by the McDonald’s fast-food chain. With jobless benefits starting to end for some, there is little hope for millions of unemployed Americans.

2. National debt exploding: Under 44 Presidents, it took America 235 years to rack up some $10 trillion in debt. Since taking office, President Obama has added another $4 trillion to the nation’s debt, with annual trillion-dollar deficits projected for years to come. Without meaningful deficit reduction, the United States is on a path that leads to interest payments on the nation’s debt exceeding total federal spending by the end of the century.

3. Housing slump continues: A recent report shows that the housing market continues to decline, as Obama administration efforts for distressed homeowners have done nothing to help. The Standard & Poor’s Case-Shiller housing index showed that prices in 20 key U.S. markets fell 3.6% in the past year and are now at 2002 levels. The only market in which prices rose is, not surprisingly, Washington, D.C., where the growth of the federal government is a boon to the local economy.

4. Economy stalls: The Commerce Department’s revised report on the gross domestic product (GDP) shows that the economy grew at an anemic 1.8% rate in the first quarter of 2011, and economists are trimming their forecasts for the rest of the year. With increased government spending failing to jump-start the economy, a double-dip recession looks more likely.

5. Price of oil skyrocketing: When Obama took office, the price of oil was $1.61 a gallon. With the Middle East turmoil, the decline of the dollar and the administration’s lack of an energy policy, oil has soared to $4 a gallon. How about letting oil companies drill in America instead of subsidizing Brazilian offshore drilling?

6. Implementation of ObamaCare: Despite lawsuits by states and waivers given to the President’s supporters, ObamaCare is still being implemented in baby steps across the nation. A study published in the McKinsey Quarterly found that 30% of companies say they are likely to end their health care coverage and dump their employees into the government exchanges. Businesses that will keep their plans face exploding costs because ObamaCare is failing to contain health care price increases as advertised.

7. Democrats resist spending cuts: Negotiations over extending the federal debt ceiling are at an impasse as Obama and congressional Democrats continue to resist seeking meaningful spending cuts to help rein in the red ink. Amazingly, since 2000 the amount the federal government spends annually has doubled after spending sprees by Presidents Bush and Obama. While the debt ceiling needs to be raised with a deadline approaching, Republicans are absolutely correct to insist on slashing government spending.

8. Credit rating threatened: Moody’s recently said that it is considering lowering America’s Triple-A credit rating because of the impasse over increasing the debt ceiling. Moody’s action came after Standard & Poor’s lowered its outlook in April for the U.S. to “negative” because of the lack of a long-term deficit reduction plan. A lower credit rating could compel the Treasury Department to offer higher yields when it sells its T-Bills, with higher interest rates for U.S. consumers sure to follow.

9. China dumps T-Bills as dollar declines: China gobbled up Treasury bills when the U.S. ramped up its deficit following the 2008 economic crisis, but now has divested 97% of its holdings of short-term U.S. government securities. China held a total of $1.175 trillion of the securities last October as the Obama administration’s deficits skyrocketed. Those holdings have now fallen to $5.69 billion, and China has also started to sell off its long-term Treasury bonds as the decline in the dollar is eroding their value.

10. Consumer confidence down: Consumer spending is considered the engine of the U.S. economy, accounting for about two-thirds of the nation’s GDP. But a survey from the business-advisory firm AlixPartners found that 63% of Americans said they feel “not good” or “bad” about the economy, up from 49% from a year ago. And those surveyed said they will delay by at least a year making major purchases on vacations or buying a new car. Not good news for a certain President seeking reelection next year.--Human Events

* 6/22/11--"Acting ATF director Kenneth Melson is apparently ready to take the fall for what may be the most morally repulsive scandal to befall the Obama administration so far. Our neighbor Mexico lies bleeding from a long, vicious war to fight seven major drug cartels at once. Some 38,000 have been left dead since 2006. Amid all this, U.S. ATF agents had orders from on high to supply U.S. weapons to cartel middlemen buying them on U.S. soil for the odd purpose of 'tracing' them. The news that Melson is resigning seems to be a bid by the Obama administration to paint this as simply an example of Keystone Kop-style bungling being corrected. But many things suggest the operation may have been done for political purposes, and not merely stupidity. The idea behind 'Operation Fast and Furious' was to let gun dealers sell weapons to cartel middlemen, who would then ship them to criminal gangs in Mexico, and damn the consequences. ... There was no effort to trace the weapons even after letting them get out. If the weapons weren't traced, why was this operation sanctioned? ... [Barack Obama ... wanted to reinstate an assault-weapon ban in 2008, but said he did not have the political capital to do it.] Bob Owens, writing for Pajamas Media, noted that the administration seemed to want to whip up a crisis requiring a crackdown on guns in the U.S. It gets worse. President Obama has long wanted gun-control-oriented ATF agent Andrew Traver to head the agency. Now, with Melson rumored to be ready to quit this week, he may get his way and benefit. There are real questions that must be answered about who knew about this, and when. An American lies murdered for what may be political aims. He has a right to justice -- as high up as it goes."--Investor's Business Daily (From Patriot Post Chronicle)

* 6/21/11--This week, House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa held the first Congressional hearing about the Obama Justice Department and Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms Operation Fast and Furious. An operation where the government was willingly putting semi-automatic weapons into the hands of killers, resulting in the deaths of two federal agents and countless innocents in Mexico. The hearing opened up a slew of questions and Issa is just getting started in gathering of information about the lethal project, however, Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich couldn't answer one simple question: Who in Washington authorized Operation Fast and Furious? In his opening statement, Weich said that the Justice Department had complied and cooperated with the Oversight Committee, adding the DOJ had provided information requested through subpoenas from Issa in his investigation. The problem is, the Justice Department has not complied and has refused to give the Chairman any valuable information surrounding the case. Issa has said he believes Eric Holder knew about this operation and won’t stop until information requested is provided and justice is served. ATF Director Kenneth Melson is expected to resign over the scandal.--townhall.com

* 6/21/11--In recent years, the job of United States Senator has evidently been added to the list of ‘jobs that Americans won’t do.’ Harry Reid’s Senate has categorically shirked its core constitutional responsibility by refusing to pass a budget for over two years. Concurrently, the Senate has been preoccupied with feckless, unconstitutional legislation that fails to deal with any of the paramount public policy problems facing the nation. Today, Chuck Schumer, with the help of Mitch McConnell and Lamar Alexander, plans to vitiate one of the Senate’s few remaining constitutional duties; advising and consenting to presidential appointees. The Presidential Appointment Efficiency and Streamlining Act (S.679), which was never reported out of a committee, would eliminate the confirmation requirement for 200 presidential appointees. This bill would completely abrogate the safeguards against tyranny that were established in the “Appointments Clause” of the constitution. The bill has seven Republican co-sponsors: Lamar Alexander, Scott Brown, Susan Collins, Mike Johanns, Jon Kyl, Richard Lugar, and Mitch McConnell. One would think that without the inconvenient burden of dealing with the budget process, the Senate would have plenty of time to execute its ‘advise and consent’ duties. They are claiming that the confirmation process is too cumbersome and time-consuming, and as such, is precluding other more important legislation. The reality is just the opposite. Their abdication of their core responsibilities has left them with nothing other than executive confirmations on their plate. Senator Marco Rubio succinctly observes the priorities of the Senate in a piece for the Daily Caller today:

Meanwhile, in the five months I have been in the Senate, Democratic leaders have focused on a reauthorization of the Federal Aviation Administration, a patent bill, a bill to increase spending on the Small Business Administration and a plan to increase spending on the Economic Development Administration, a relic of the Great Society that funnels debt-financed cash to states and localities (never mind that the president’s own Fiscal Commission recommended eliminating it entirely). The Senate has taken just 91 roll call votes, many on non-controversial nominations, and a third of our time has been spent in “quorum calls,” literally doing nothing. No one should be under any illusion about the desire of leaders in the Senate to confront our sagging economy and looming debt crisis. Now, they have the moxie to complain that the confirmation process is distracting them from more important legislation! Undoubtedly, there is a need to expedite the presidential appointee process. However, ceding more power to an administration that is overzealous to impose policy by administrative fiat, is not the way to go. Congress has slowly abjured its power to the executive branch by writing open-ended legislation, granting federal agencies wide latitude to promulgate destruction over our economy. Obama has already used radical executive appointees for the purpose of consolidating power in the executive branch. Why would any Republican sign on to such a dangerous expansion of executive power? Whom do they think Obama will appoint to these positions if there is no oversight? Here’s a novel idea for streamlining the confirmation process of presidential appointees: shrink the size of government so there will be no need for most of these jobs. It’s high time for Congress to halt its self-immolation, and reign in the executive department behemoth. The Senate is scheduled to hold the first cloture vote on S.679 later this evening or on Wednesday, following the expected failure on passage of the inane Economic Development Revitalization Act. Call your senators and ask them if they plan to outsource their jobs to Obama. Tell them to keep the presidential appointment process in the hands of the elected branch of government and vote no on S.679--redstate.com

* 6/22/11--(CNSNews.com) - The average monthly casualty rate for U.S. military forces serving in Afghanistan has increased 5-fold since President Barack Obama was inaugurated on Jan. 20, 2009. 1,540 U.S. troops have been killed in Afghanistan since Oct. 7, 2001, when U.S. forces began fighting in that country to oust the Taliban regime that had been harboring al Qaeda and to track down and capture or kill al Qaeda terrorists. During the Bush presidency, which ended on Jan. 20, 2009 with the inauguration of President Obama, U.S. troops were present in Afghanistan for 87.4 months and suffered 570 casualties—a rate of 6.5 deaths per month. During the Obama presidency, through today, U.S. troops have been present in Afghanistan for 29.1 months and have suffered 970 casualties—a rate of 33.3 deaths per month. This evening President Obama is expected to announce the scope of U.S. troop withdrawals set to begin next month. Of the 1,540 U.S. casualties in Afghanistan, according to CNSNews.com’s database of all casualties in the war, 1,340 have resulted from enemy action and the other 200 have resulted from non-combat accidents, illnesses and other non-combat causes. The 970 U.S. casualties that have occurred while President Obama has been commander in chief equal 63 percent--or almost two-thirds—of all U.S. casualties that have taken place in the nearly-ten-year-long war. 889 of the 970 U.S. casualties in Afghanistan that have occurred during the Obama presidency—or about 92 percent—have been combat-related casualties. During Obama’s presidency, U.S. troops have given their lives in the service of their country in Afghanistan at an average rate of more than one per day. CNSNews.com’s database of U.S. military fatalities in Afghanistan is derived from official casualty reports issued by the Department of Defense (DOD) augmented by information taken from media accounts.

* 6/23/11--U.S. jobless claims increased 429,000 last week, exceeding the highest estimate in a Bloomberg News survey of 47 economists.--bloomberg.com

* 6/28/11--A generic Republican candidate now holds a four-point lead over President Obama in a hypothetical 2012 election matchup. It's a fifth week in a row that the GOP candidate has been ahead and the widest gap between the candidates to date. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds a generic Republican candidate earns support from 46% of Likely U.S. Voters, while the president picks up 42% of the vote. Three percent (3%) prefer some other candidate, and nine percent (9%) are undecided. Last week, the Republican held a 45% to 43% advantage. In weekly surveys since the beginning of May, support for Obama has ranged from 42% to 45%, while the Republican has earned 43% to 46% of the vote. Rasmussen Reports will provide new data on this generic matchup each week until the field of prospective Republican nominees narrows to a few serious contenders. Republicans also hold a seven-point lead over Democrats on the Generic Congressional Ballot for the week ending Sunday, June 26. Republicans have led on this ballot every week since June 2009.--rasmussenreports.com

* 6/28/11-- This week, a memo written by ICE Director John Morton and sent to all agents in charge, chief counsel, office directors and special agents, states ICE doesn't have enough resources to deal with illegal immigrants who happen to be students, and therefore, they should have less of a chance of deportation due to the criteria used when making decisions about who will be deported known as "prosecutorial discretion." The memo encourages agents to keep education status, mode of illegal entry into the United States and illegal alien connection to the military in mind before issuing a deportation, encouraging agents to give illegal immigrants who meet certain criteria more tolerance. Despite Congressional rejection, the DREAM Act has been enacted by a process of ICE agents deciding who should and should not be deported on a case-by-case basis rather than equally under the law.--townhall.com

* 6/28/11--President Obama and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Director John Morton have, in effect, decreed their own version of the DREAM Act virtually bypassing Congress! Under expanded guidelines set in place Friday by an ICE "prosecutorial discretion" memo, agents are instructed to exercise discretion on a case-by-case basis to NOT enforce immigration laws if illegal immigrants committing minor crimes are enrolled in an education center or if there are ties to the US military. Reacting quickly to the memo, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee is now crafting a bill that would halt the Obama administration's overreaching power to grant amnesty to illegal immigrants. Smith said that under the new guidelines ICE agents could defer the deportations of "millions of deportable illegal and criminal immigrants" and said the legislation is necessary because, "The Obama administration cannot continue to pick and choose which laws it will enforce." Countering Rep. Smith's initiative, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) is now calling for a Senate hearing on the DREAM Act. --Grassroots Action Alert
* 6/29/11--LONDON — Iran has carried out secret tests of missiles capable of delivering a nuclear payload in breach of UN resolutions, British Foreign Secretary William Hague said Wednesday. Hague's comments came a day after Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards said they had fired 14 missiles in an exercise, one of them a medium-range weapon capable of striking Israel or US targets in the Gulf. In a statement to lawmakers, Hague said: "Iran has also been carrying out covert ballistic missile tests and rocket launches, including testing missiles capable of delivering a nuclear payload in contravention of UN resolution 1929." He said Iran had also announced plans to triple its capacity to produce 20 percent enriched uranium, adding: "These are enrichment levels far greater than is needed for peaceful nuclear energy. "We will maintain and continue to increase pressure on Iran to negotiate an agreement on their nuclear programme," including sanctions, he said. On Tuesday US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said Iran was "bragging" about its assets, but did not specify whether Washington thought the tested missiles were nuclear-capable. Iran's missile programme, which is under the control of the powerful Guards along with its space projects, has been a mounting source of concern in the West. Western governments fear Tehran is seeking to develop a ballistic capability to enable it to launch atomic warheads under cover of its civil nuclear programme. Tehran denies any such ambition. --AFP

* 6/30/11--On economic growth, real GDP has risen 0.8% over the 13 quarters since the recession began, compared to an average increase of 9.9% in past recoveries. From the beginning of the recession to April 2011, real personal income has grown just .9% compared to 9.4% for the same period in previous post 1960 recessions. The standard response from Obama apologists is that recession of 2008 and 2009 was different because, as former Clinton administration economist Robert Shapiro puts it, 'this was a financial crisis, and these take longer to recover from.' In fact, in most cases, the deeper the recession, the stronger the recovery to make up for lost ground." --columnist Stephen Moore(From Patriot Post Chronicle)